


River Always Finds the Sea

by Theoroark



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Death, Established Relationship, Grief/Mourning, Jewish Soldier: 76 | Jack Morrison, M/M, Medical Experimentation, SEP era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-28
Updated: 2018-01-28
Packaged: 2019-03-10 16:48:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13505676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Theoroark/pseuds/Theoroark
Summary: Prompt:Fast DeathIf nothing else, the SEP taught them how to die.





	River Always Finds the Sea

The first death came a couple weeks into the program. Gabriel had been at a table eating lunch with all the others– no one had been confined to a hospital bed yet. Harris had been a little pale the whole time, but none of them had been feeling particularly good recently, so they did not think much of it. In fact, the fact that Harris had suddenly spun in her seat and vomited on the linoleum floor was more cause for groans and uncomfortable laughter than any real concern.

 

But then Harris fell from her seat and began to seize violently. Her head hit the linoleum hard. Gabriel heard staff speaking urgently on their walkies. Sabrino pulled off her sweater and put it under Harris’s head. You weren’t actually supposed to put your wallet in a seizing person’s mouth, he remembered vaguely. In any case, he hadn’t had his wallet in weeks.

 

The medics came within two minutes and cleared them out. They stood in the doorway though, and watched them work. Gabriel could just see Harris between all the mint-green scrubs. She was moving slower now, despite the urgency of the medics. Then, they slowed. Then, they stood up.

 

There were about a dozen of them, huddled in the doorframe of the cafeteria, watching Harris's still body. The medics clearly had no idea what to do about that.

 

“She died alone,” Jack said in their room, that night. Gabriel frowned.

 

“What are you talking about? We were there. The medics were there.”

 

“That’s not– it’s not the same.” Gabriel rolled over. In the dim light, he could just make out Jack lying on his back, staring at the ceiling. “She wasn’t with people who cared about her, really, at the end. She must have been so scared.”

 

Gabriel could think of a some responses to that– he did not know of a person beloved enough to make him unafraid of death, the medics knew her about as well as he and Jack did, they were all alone at the end. But none of that felt particularly useful. Even he could tell they weren’t real responses to what Jack was saying.

 

Jack rolled over and looked at him. “If that happens to me, can you stay with me?”

 

“Yes,” Gabriel said automatically. He could just make out Jack blinking in surprise.

 

“That was fast.” Gabriel shrugged.

 

“It’s important to you. And I mean. I get what you’re saying.”

 

Jack laughed a little. “No, you don’t.”

 

“Not really,” Gabriel agreed. “But it’s important to you.”

 

Jack was silent for a while after that, and Gabriel thought that he was satisfied. But as he was starting to relax, Jack said, “What about the others?”

 

“What about them?” Gabriel asked.

 

“I’d stay for them,” Jack said. It sounded almost petulant, as though he were waiting for Gabriel to make fun of him for it. “Would you?”

 

“I don’t know,” he said slowly. “I guess I’d need to know if they wanted me to, too.”

 

“It’s not really something you talk about.”

 

He rolled over again and saw Jack still watching him with those stupid big eyes. “Then I guess we’re going to have,” he said. He could just make out Jack smiling.

 

“Tomorrow,” he said. “I’ll tell people to meet in the rec room after dinner.”

 

He missed college, missed being able to learn and the ease of engaging with people through knowledge. Between that and the sheer weight of the thing, he ended up handling people’s last requests as a series of lessons. First, Jack had taught him the Mourner’s Kaddish, late in their room one night. His eyes flickered every time Gabriel stumbled over a word, not with anger but with an awful anxiety and urgency. And so Gabriel repeated it to himself, over and over again as he ran laps, like a mantra. Jack eventually seemed, if not satisfied, at least calmer.

 

His family had never been particularly enthusiastic about attending church. But Sabrino’s had. And so he learned the Lord’s Prayer, along with the rest of them. Half of them recited Salat al-Janazah for Dhillon and Aoun, half of them lectured the responding doctors on how they should be bathed, shrouded, buried facing Mecca. Lee had them all memorize the lyrics to some stupid indie song, because she said it was a good song to die to. Jack sat next to her as the defibrillator failed, again and again, and sang it off key.

 

Over half the program had died before Jack asked him, “What do you want, if it happens?”

 

Gabe could think of some responses to that– “if” was a bit optimistic, assuming he would have his druthers was a bit optimistic, he wanted his family and his friends back home and maybe a couple TV cameras, so people would know what was going on here, but he wasn’t sure Jack could arrange all that. But none of that was useful and it wasn’t why Jack had asked.

 

“I don’t know,” he said. “I’ve been thinking, but I can’t think of anything I’d really want.” The bedsheets across from his rustled, and Jack sat down on the floor at the head of his bed. He tilted his head back and Gabriel smiled benignly at him.

 

“You don’t care about religion,” Jack said. Gabriel shook his head. “Or tradition.” He shook his head again. “Or shitty music.” Laughter, head shake. “But I know you care about a lot. And so I don’t want to just give you nothing.”

 

Gabriel rubbed at his chin. “Just, you know. Stay clear, I guess,” he said. “Don’t get into trouble for me. Keep pushing for them to be as transparent as possible about what killed me. Just take care of yourself.”

 

“Gabe,” Jack said. His voice was small now and he was still watching him with his stupid big eyes. Gabriel felt horribly sick and warm. He had interpreted the requests as something done purely in service of the dying, and tried to subvert it. The staff and their tests kept telling him how smart he was, and he kept finding ways to prove them wrong. As though he had never stood up from the side of some recently dead friend or acquaintance or annoyingly loud chewer and thought, _At least I gave them that; at least I could do something._

 

“Fuck. Okay. The only thing I care about here is you,” he said. “So just… be there, okay?”

 

It wasn’t quite true, and they both knew that, but when Gabriel said it he believed it more than he believed in anything else at the moment. He pushed himself up on his elbow and kissed Jack’s forehead, and then fell back on his bed.

 

“Okay,” Jack said softly. “I’ll be there. I promise.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm @tacticalgrandma if you want to talk to me there.
> 
> Thanks so much for reading, and any comments/kudos would mean the world to me!


End file.
